Do you need a roadworthy certificate to sell your car? It depends on your state

Whether you need a roadworthy certificate before you sell comes down to your state. Queensland puts the job on the seller and the certificate dies at 2,000km. New South Wales asks a private seller for nothing. Here is what each state requires.

• Do I need a roadworthy certificate to sell my car?
• What does each state require when you sell privately?
• Who can issue a certificate and how long does it last?
• What happens if the car fails the inspection?
• Who pays for the roadworthy certificate?
• What should a buyer ask for when the seller’s state requires nothing?

Do I need a roadworthy certificate to sell my car?

In Queensland and Victoria, yes. In New South Wales, no. In the ACT it hangs on how old the car is, and the remaining states and territories each set their own rule. A roadworthy certificate, called a safety certificate in Queensland and a certificate of roadworthiness in Victoria, is a document from a state-authorised tester confirming the car met minimum safety standards on the day it was looked at. It is not a registration, not a service record and not a warranty.

What really separates the states is who the rule binds. Queensland names the seller, so the certificate is something you sort out before the car leaves your driveway. Victoria’s requirement runs through the transfer process, and Consumer Affairs Victoria says the certificate you give the buyer should be less than 30 days old. The ACT hangs the inspection off the buyer’s registration transfer, which makes the cost negotiable rather than fixed on one party.

Two things follow. If your state wants a certificate, book the inspection before you advertise, because a fail changes both what the car is worth and what you can honestly claim in the ad. If your state wants nothing, you have nothing to buy, and the job of checking the car lands on whoever is handing over the money. Worth knowing too what the paperwork leaves you exposed to after settlement, which is a separate question from the certificate and covered in our piece on what a registration transfer leaves you liable for.

What does each state require when you sell privately?

Queensland and Victoria both want a certificate, on different clocks and from different testers. New South Wales wants none from a private seller, and the ACT wants one only for older or imported vehicles. The table below covers the four jurisdictions where the private-sale position is published, drawn from the Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads, Victoria’s Department of Transport and Planning, the NSW Government and Access Canberra.

Jurisdiction	Certificate required for a private sale	Who the rule names	Valid for	Who can issue it
Queensland	Yes, a safety certificate	Seller	2 months, or 2,000km if sooner	Approved inspection station
Victoria	Yes, a certificate of roadworthiness	Seller, per Consumer Affairs Victoria	30 days from issue	Licensed vehicle tester, approved premises
New South Wales	No	Not applicable	Not applicable	Not applicable
ACT	Yes if over 6 years old or imported, up to 4.5 tonnes	Buyer, at registration transfer	Confirm with Access Canberra	Confirm with Access Canberra

Queensland

Queensland triggers the safety certificate in three situations: registration moving to a new owner, a car coming onto Queensland plates from interstate, and an unregistered car going back on the road. As a seller, you need the certificate in hand before you hand a registered car to any buyer who is not a licensed motor dealer, according to Transport and Main Roads. Exemptions exist, including a car kept in a designated exempt area when it is sold, a car passing to the beneficiary of an estate, and a handover between husband and wife.

Victoria

A Victorian certificate of roadworthiness stays current for 30 days after the day it is issued, and the same certificate can cover more than one registration or transfer while those 30 days last, per the Department of Transport and Planning. That short clock is the reason not to book the inspection the moment you decide to sell. A car that sits on the market for six weeks will need a second one.

New South Wales

The NSW Government’s guidance for selling a used car puts no safety inspection on a private seller at all. The one report it raises belongs to the trade: a licensed dealer selling on consignment needs a current RMS inspection report. What NSW asks of you is administrative instead. You have 14 days from the sale to lodge a notice of disposal, late lodgement can attract a fee, and there is no charge for lodging it either through the Service NSW website or at a centre.

The same page sets out what to settle before you advertise. You need documents showing the car is yours to sell, some confidence the buyer will be able to register it, and confirmation that nothing is still owed on it to a lender. NSW also tells sellers to hold off signing any transfer paperwork until the money, or the agreed trade, is actually in hand.

Australian Capital Territory

In the ACT, cars and utes up to 4.5 tonnes that have passed their sixth birthday, plus any imported vehicle, need a roadworthy inspection before the new owner’s name can go on the registration, Access Canberra says. The buyer gets 14 days before a late fee kicks in, and the transfer has to be lodged in person at a Service Centre. Access Canberra also warns that extra inspections can be triggered by how old a vehicle is, what type it is and what it has been used for, so a trailer, a heavy ute or a car worked commercially is worth a phone call before you list it.

South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory

Each of these sets its own inspection rules through its own transport authority, and none of them matches the four above exactly. Check your own transport department directly rather than relying on advice written for Queensland or Victoria, which is most of what circulates online.

Who can issue a certificate and how long does it last?

Only a tester the state has authorised can issue one, and it stops being usable quickly, somewhere between 30 days and two months depending on where you are. In Queensland, only an approved inspection station can issue a safety certificate, according to Transport and Main Roads. In Victoria, the job belongs to a licensed vehicle tester working out of state-approved premises, usually a garage or a servo, per the Department of Transport and Planning. Your regular mechanic may be neither, so ask before you book.

A Queensland certificate in a private seller’s hands runs for two months, or 2,000km if the odometer gets there first, and the distance limit kills it even with weeks left on the calendar, Transport and Main Roads states. A certificate issued to a licensed motor dealer runs on different numbers, 3 months or 1,000km. The distance limit catches private sellers out more often than the date does, because a handful of test drives and one long trip eat a decent slice of 2,000km.

The two states also differ in a way that matters when a sale falls over. A Queensland safety certificate covers one transfer only, so if your buyer backs out and you sell to someone else, you buy another certificate. Victoria is more forgiving on that point and less forgiving on the calendar, 30 days against two months, with repeat use allowed inside the window. Put simply, Queensland gives you more time but one shot, and Victoria gives you less time and as many attempts as fit.

What happens if the car fails the inspection?

In Victoria you get a written report listing what needs attention, then a fortnight to carry out the work and bring the car back for re-checking, the Department of Transport and Planning says. That report earns its keep even if you decide against fixing everything, because it tells you exactly what a buyer’s own mechanic is likely to find.

The timing argument is simple. Get the inspection done before the photos and the ad, not after you have agreed a price. A fail found mid-negotiation hands the buyer a reason to reopen the number, while a fail found early is just a repair bill you can decide whether to pay. Which repairs are worth paying for is a judgement call, and we have worked through it in our piece on what is worth spending money on when preparing a car for sale.

Be straight with buyers about what the certificate does not cover. Victoria’s transport department warns that the inspection looks at safety items alone and reveals nothing about mechanical reliability or a car’s overall condition. A car can pass with a tired gearbox, a wheel bearing that is noisy but not yet failed, or no service history at all.

Who pays for the roadworthy certificate?

The seller pays in the two states where the rule names the seller, and it is open to negotiation in the ACT where the rule attaches to the buyer’s transfer. Queensland obliges you to hold the certificate before the car changes hands, so the cost sits with you by law. In Victoria, Consumer Affairs Victoria tells sellers to supply a certificate under 30 days old, which puts the bill on the seller in practice. The same body also tells sellers to get the car out of their name from the date of sale, so the buyer’s fines do not land on them.

Queensland publishes its fee, which makes budgeting easy. From 1 July 2026 the charge is $102.70 with GST for a car or ute at or below 4,500kg gross vehicle mass, $66.00 with GST for a motorcycle, and $51.45 with GST for trailers between 750kg and 4,500kg aggregate trailer mass, according to Transport and Main Roads. The fee buys the inspection and the paperwork, not the repairs, and a sale that collapses means paying it twice.

Victoria sets no statewide price, so ring two or three licensed testers near you and compare. Judge the certificate against your other selling costs rather than on its own. If the paperwork and preparation start to outweigh the gap between the offers in front of you, our comparison of trade-in versus private sale works through where the money actually goes.

What should a buyer ask for when the seller’s state requires nothing?

Ask for an independent pre-purchase inspection and pay for it yourself, because in New South Wales nobody has checked the car on your behalf. The NSW Government puts no inspection duty on a private seller, so a missing certificate is not a warning sign there. It only means the safety check has not happened, and you are the one with a reason to arrange it.

Two further checks matter wherever you are. NSW tells sellers to clear any outstanding finance before they advertise, which is precisely the thing a buyer should verify rather than take on trust, and a PPSR check before you pay is how that gets done. Ask to see the seller’s proof that the car is theirs to sell as well, since that is the other precondition NSW puts on them.

Best for a seller in Queensland or Victoria who wants the sale to settle on the day, because a current certificate lets the buyer transfer registration without going away and coming back. Not for a buyer treating the certificate as a condition report, because it covers safety items on one day and says nothing about the engine, the transmission or the service history.

So the decision is short. Selling in Queensland or Victoria, book an authorised tester before you write the ad and treat the fee as a cost of sale. Selling in New South Wales, spend nothing on a certificate and put the effort into the notice of disposal and proof of clear title instead. Selling in the ACT, measure the car’s age against the six-year threshold and agree in writing who pays for the inspection before you shake hands. Selling anywhere else, call your transport authority first, because the answer is not the same everywhere and getting it wrong stalls the transfer.